


Inscrutable

by allofuswithwings



Series: Space Dementia [3]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Drama, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Loss, Melodrama, Mystery, POV Multiple, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-18
Updated: 2021-03-18
Packaged: 2021-03-27 02:07:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30115509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/allofuswithwings/pseuds/allofuswithwings
Summary: The Doctor and Rose investigate the mysterious disappearance of Rose's unborn child, though without each other's knowledge. And what are the strange voices Rose keeps hearing? Calling her in her dreams and down the dark corridors of the Tardis. And why is the Doctor afraid of them?
Relationships: Tenth Doctor/Rose Tyler
Series: Space Dementia [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2136945
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Teaspoon in 2008 under the title Desolate Planes. I was but a baby fanfic writer at the time so it's cringy af.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Upon returning to the Tardis, Rose finds herself haunted by strange and mysterious sounds.

Rose lay almost still, eyes open upwards at the ceiling of the Tardis. The heavy, muffled, warm water filled her ears, her body floating just below the surface of the bath water. Her fingers swayed a little to keep herself up and she inhaled a deep breath of steaming, thick air before closing her eyes.

And there it was again. That noise.

Just under the dense layers of the languid water, and the ever-present hum of the Tardis. Barely noticeable. Except to her.

And as she kept her eyes shut and body still, it grew louder, stronger. A strange, murmuring echo that called out to her. No words and no distinct voice. It was hollow, like a memory of many voices and many words, forgotten long ago.

They whispered to her now, like before, pleading, begging, beckoning, but she had no idea where to or why.

Rose kept concentrating, kept still, trying to draw the echoes closer, let them tell her what they wanted. They filled all the corners of her head, but still vague and wordless, resonating in her mind and flooding her body.

She felt heavy with their presence and reached out, trying to grab hold of something tangible; a word, a phrase, anything. But they eluded her, just continuing murmurs, whispers, calling her to them without any explanation. All she could hear and feel now was their pull, hypnotising her; no more floating, no more warm water, no damp air. Just the voices, echoing.

Until the Doctor pulled her abruptly from her reverie, hauling her body up from the tub. Rose found herself gasping for air, spluttering on water, and the Doctor babbling at her angrily, worriedly. He looked panicked and concerned, and after a moment she was able to discern what he was saying to her.

“What were you doing in there, eh?” he asked. “You were under the water, I thought you were drowning!”

Rose coughed a few more times, smiling sheepishly, and wiped her wet hair out of her face. The Doctor was still holding her under her armpits, in sitting position, his eyes searching hers.

She was glad she had decided to bathe in her blue cotton dress, or this situation would have been more awkward had she been nude. The clothing was a habit she had picked up partially from a visit to the eighteenth century where bathing in the sea or baths required fuller clothing than what she was used to. It was also due to Doctor’s bad habit of bursting in unannounced when he was eager to show her something new. So, it ended up being easier this way when Rose just wanted a hot soak.

Not that she was ashamed of being naked in front of the Doctor, not after everything that had happened. But currently they were going through an awkward stage as it was, she didn’t need to add to that.

In not so many words, it had been agreed that after the baby was born they would look at exploring a physical relationship. But after losing the baby, Rose had been so distraught with grief, she found herself unable to connect with the Doctor. She had no idea how to talk to him anymore, and he didn’t help with his usual lack of sensitivity to complex human emotions.

She had decided to take a break back home to get away from him and spend time with her mum, which had helped enormously in coming to terms with her loss. When she’d returned to the Tardis (with much protest from her mother), the strange whispers and echoes had started.

So quietly at first, and only in her dreams. But then she began to hear them down the long hallways of the Tardis. Like ghosts walking the corridors, but without the apparition. There one moment, gone the next, and always just out of reach.

And the Doctor didn’t even seem to hear them. On several occasions, they’d been standing quietly in the control room or the kitchen when the murmurs had started. Rose would look around, startled, but the Doctor didn’t react at all. He would only look up or away from what he was doing if he noticed her reaction.

But she would deny anything was wrong. She hadn’t told him about any of it. She didn’t want him thinking she was cracking up, or explain it away as post-traumatic stress. Rose had been around the Doctor enough now to know that just because someone sees something no-one else does, doesn’t mean its not really there. And besides that, something burning deep inside her told her these whispers were important somehow.

Rose sat up properly in the tub, smoothing her hair down and reaching for her towel.

Just fell asleep in the bath,” she replied dismissively. “Just a bit tired, ya know?”

The Doctor looked at her strangely, apparently not quite satisfied with her explanation. Still with furrowed brow, he nodded slowly and stood up, holding his arms out to help her up.

“You sure you’re okay?” he asked, as she squeezed the excess water out of her dress and dried herself down with the towel.

She stepped out of the tub onto the bathroom mat, only giving him brief glances.

“Yeah, fine,” she replied breezily. “Now shove off so I can get changed.”

For a moment, a cheeky expression appeared on the Doctor’s face and Rose thought he was about to suggest something saucy. But then, as though it was never there, it was gone again, replaced by what had become his usual expression of emotional avoidance and faux-flippant attitude.

“Okay, well I’ll go and set the coordinates for Tatro City,” he said. “Let me know when you’re ready and we’ll head off.”

With that, he turned, pulling off his soggy-sleeved jacket and heading out the door.

Rose sighed to herself, wanting to call him back and tell him everything that was going on. And not just the voices and the dreams; all the things she was feeling and going through. She wanted to tell him how much it had hurt, and that she needed him, just to hold her and tell her everything would be okay.

She wanted him to know that carrying his child was the best thing that had ever happened to her, and made her realise exactly how much he really meant to her. That she loved him and needed him, wanted him. She longed to feel his skin on hers again and ached for his body to make her feel whole again.

But she couldn’t tell him. The fear in her would rise up that he would understand, that he’d just treat her like another overly-emotional, young human. So she kept silent, the words going unsaid. Like they always did.

Rose was determined get to the bottom of the mysterious voices on her own; she didn’t need his help this time. Though she wasn’t quite sure what she may be getting herself into. Did she really want to find the source?


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor begins his search to find the people responsible for the theft of their daughter.

The Doctor’s mind kept wandering. He couldn’t help it. Every time he tried to concentrate on the screen, scanning the names and numbers in front of him, he would start drifting again and lose his place.

In his head, over and over again, replaying the expressions on Rose’s face and the look in her eyes when they talked about their baby. The way the corners of her mouth curled up into that glowing smile when he’d touched her belly, babbling from his own excitement about nothing and everything. How her eyes had shined with tears of pain and pride when he’d discovered they had a daughter, before he lost her. And the bleak, hollow expressions that haunted her face thereafter as she slipped further and further from him into her own grieving abyss.

It was doing his head in as he tried in vain, once again, to concentrate on the list in front of him for any clues to his daughter’s disappearance. As soon as he’d taken Rose back home to recover, he’d done everything in his power to find out exactly what had happened to their baby and why. He’d taken readings in the medical bay to determine what residual energy and any other clues there might still be there. There wasn’t much to go on, because all the Doctor remembered was the baby being there one moment, struggling to hold onto life, and then in a flash of blue light, she was gone.

The data he’d gathered from the medical bay didn’t really help, because evidently the Tardis had no idea what had gone on either. No shield or hull breach had been recorded, nor inter-dimensional energy readings of any kind, so it wasn’t someone slipping in and out of the void. Not that the Doctor knew of anyone that had that ability any more; it had only really been the Time Lords’ domain, and of course the Daleks. But they would never be involved in something like this. This had too much heart for them, it was much too personal and emotional, they would never think of anything like this.

So, the Doctor had had to start from square one. Investigate this mystery without all his fancy Time Lord gadgets and technology, because now it seemed like they were completely useless. The first thing he’d done was return to the one person who he now knew was involved in this horrific incident. The person who’d forced Rose into an early labour: Dr Teng. However, it was no surprise that when the Doctor had got there, he was nowhere to be found, and initially, the medical centre staff were not forthcoming as to his whereabouts. But that quickly changed when the Doctor, fuelled by grief and rage he’d not felt in a long time, had become much more forceful in his persuasions.

***

The Doctor had the pixie receptionist in a vice-like grip by her wrists, his face very close to hers, jaw clenched. His expression was one of disquiet anger as he gave her a cold, hard stare. She was struggling to get free but his hold on her was too strong as he leant over the reception desk.

“I asked you nicely, to tell me where he is,” he said, his voice unnervingly calm and even. “I used to be such a patient man, but I’ve grown so old now and I don’t have time for this.”

He let go of one of the receptionist’s wrists to grab his sonic screwdriver out of his jacket pocket. He reached down and placed it against the PA microphone behind the counter, pressing the button to begin its usual hum and blue illumination. A horrific, high-pitched squealing noise emerged from the speakers all over the clinic, and staff and patients clamped their hands over their ears in pain, some buckling over from the noise.

The receptionist and several of the patients in the room began crying out as the awful sound overwhelmed them, drilling into their ears and their minds. Throughout the racket, the Doctor stood apparently unaffected, still looking at the woman calmly, watching as she writhed and screamed out. He eventually let go of the button on the screwdriver and the noise ceased. There was an audible sigh of relief from everyone in the room and the receptionist sagged back down into her chair, eyes damp with tears.

But the Doctor wasn’t done just yet. He reached forward, pressing the sonic screwdriver against the earpiece she was wearing, his thumb hovering over the activation button. He wrenched her closer to him, his hand still gripping her wrist, his eyes now fiery as his restraint began to fade. She stared at him with wide eyes, terrified, still whimpering.

“Tell me where he is right now, or what happened in those speakers will happen straight down your ear canal,” he growled. “And, believe me, the resonation frequency that close will do much more than just give you a headache.”

***

After that, the woman began blubbering that she didn’t know where Dr. Teng was but she could give the Doctor information and contacts to find out. She’d given him records of all his video and audio call logs, as well as his last know address and all other places he’d stayed and liked to visit. His home address had been a dead end, completely cleaned out as though no-one had ever even been there, much as the Doctor had expected. And all the hotels, bars and eateries he enquired at barely knew of Teng. They recognised him as dropping in occasionally, but couldn’t give much more information, even when the Doctor was persuasive.

It seemed that Teng had kept very much to himself, which wasn’t that surprising from what the Doctor knew of him previously. He hadn’t really known him that well personally, more through his own contacts, as an ambitious and radical scientist. A lot of what Teng did and had done was looked down upon by the conservative intellectual community, which was part of the Doctor’s attraction to him. So, Teng tended to keep his life private to stay out of too much trouble, though now it seemed he’d gotten himself into something more sinister than his usual work. The Doctor was sure that deep down, he was a good man, but something or someone must have persuaded him to risk crossing this Time Lord.

The Doctor screwed up his face, rubbing his eyes with the fingers of one hand, and sighed, running his other hand through his hair. He was now going over the video and voice calls Dr. Teng had made since Rose and the Doctor had visited him, to see if there was anything that could give any ideas as to what this was all about. So far, he’d found nothing, just all regular business calls to and from patients and other doctors and scientists, with nothing at all out of the ordinary. He hated doing this kind of detective work, it was so old-fashioned and tedious. He preferred working out complex puzzles and mysteries through field work and risking his neck, than sitting in front of the Tardis screens with what was essentially just paperwork.

The Doctor had briefly considered going back to the time when he and Rose had visited Teng and find out in person what exactly was going on. Or even visit him immediately after their last visit. But the Tardis wasn’t always exactly precise in her timing these days, and he risked crossing his own timeline and creating all sorts of universe-imploding paradoxes. So that was not really an option, and he would have to make do with what information he had.

As he was resting his head back against the railings behind the flight seat, legs propped up on the console in front of him, an audio call that the speakers were playing back made him stop. He sat up, startled, eyes wide in hope and excitement. The call was only brief, and the Doctor leaned forward to play it over again so he could listen more carefully. Frozen in a braced sitting position, his eyes darted back and forth as the voice came on the line again.

_“Teng.”_

_“I told you not to call me here – ”_

_“You need to accelerate Project One-Five-Bluestorm through to the final stage immediately. The product must be ready in six days.”_

_“But I can’t, the human species isn’t strong enough, the girl won’t survive.”_

_“Irrelevant. The bidders won’t wait any longer. Get it ready, we’re on our way.”_

The line went dead.

The Doctor jumped up in triumph, running about madly muttering “yes yes yes yes yes!” to himself. He raced back over to the monitor, scanning the log for the caller information, tapping on the controls impatiently, excitedly. He ran a hand through his hair nervously, shifting his weight from side to side between his feet. He grinned as the planet and zoned location of the incoming call appeared in front of him, and he thrust a finger exuberantly at the screen.

“Ah-ha!” he cried to the empty control room. “Gotcha!”

It didn’t seem like much to go on, just a secretive, anonymous phone call and vague mention of a human girl, but it was more than enough for the Doctor. That call had been exactly six days before Rose’s induced labour, which was too much of a coincidence to ignore. It was apparent now that at least part of this whole complicated situation had been planned by someone, and the Doctor was determined to find out who it was. As he’d said to Rose before, a baby with Time Lord genes would be of interest to at least four or five races alone that he knew about, but it was likely there was at least that that many again that he didn’t know about. Hopefully, finding the person at the source of the phone call would give him some more clues where to start, and possibly, whether his daughter was still alive.

The Doctor swallowed, trying to ignore the burning pain in his chest as his thoughts wandered to images of his daughter again. She had been so small, so fragile, but struggling, fighting to breathe and grasp onto life when he’d reached her. His hands and suit covered in blood, as he’d carefully manoeuvred his instruments around Rose’s open womb to extract their child. His hearts had been pounding, body shaking as he’d tried desperately to get her out without making things worse and losing her altogether.

The Doctor had felt her tiny, soft body in his hands only fleetingly before that brilliant flash of blue light, and she was gone. He’d been left standing in the medical bay with his cold instruments and empty hands buried in Rose’s insides, the steady beep of the health monitor machine the only sound echoing in the room. He’d stayed that way, stunned for a moment, his eyes fixed on the smooth, elastic tissue of Rose’s womb under his fingers, the organ now rendered empty by the absence of its previous contents. He’d shaken himself out of it and repaired her body quickly with his instruments, bandaging her up when he was done.

The Doctor took a deep breath and exhaled loudly, rubbing his eyes again and focusing on the Tardis’ navigation system. He calibrated it to the coordinates of where the mysterious phone call had originated from: Tatro City. But first, before he headed there, he needed to let Rose know. Not everything, of course. He didn’t want to get her hopes up about their daughter and then see them crushed; it would destroy her. But he had to tell her he had a lead on who might be behind her induced labour, other than Dr. Teng.

She’d already vaguely mentioned her own suspicions about someone plotting against them – that his sickness and her pregnancy weren’t as accidental as they first seemed. But other than that, she’d been unusually mute and inactive about the whole ordeal. She was acting so strangely these days, it seemed to him, but at least she didn’t seem quite so depressed anymore. Though she was still distant with him, not speaking her mind like she used to do when he could clearly see something going on behind those wide brown eyes of hers. But he didn’t want to pry because he didn’t feel it was his place to interfere with human emotional complexities he wasn’t privy to.

Still, it worried him and felt a little odd, like they couldn’t relax around each other anymore, which they used to be so good at. Like really good mates, travelling around together and getting themselves into and out of all sorts of trouble. Because that’s all they had ever been, he told himself – friends. Perhaps with just a bit of physical interaction sometimes, but that was fine because they both needed the relief once in a while. But nothing more than that.

He was too old for all that other stuff now. It was too hard, too painful to connect any deeper with others anymore, so he didn’t let himself. Friendship was perfectly sufficient. Well, maybe friendship with benefits, as it had almost been. But not anymore, and that was okay too. However, come to think of it, the friendship part was becoming a bit of a struggle lately, as Rose was gradually pulling away from him for some reason. The Doctor was attempting to maintain things as they always were, but he wasn’t sure if it was working. He believed it was up to Rose if she wanted to reach out to him and talk, get things back to normal. He wouldn’t push her.

He picked up his brown-rimmed glasses and slipped them back on, tightening up his tie and smoothing his suit back down. He stood up straight and paused a moment, mulling over in his head where Rose might be right now in the Tardis. It was possible to use the life-signs detector he had aboard, but was no longer allowed that option after Rose had berated him previously about spying and invasion of privacy. With a spring of hope in his step from the possible lead he had found, he leapt away from the control console and up the steps to hallway, in search of Rose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is all I have written of this fic and it remains unfinished. I don't know if I will ever come back to it.


End file.
